Monorails

I’ve been on the road the past two weeks visiting homeless centers in Miami, Los Angeles and San Diego. As Haven or Hope gets closer to opening, we are re-looking at the best and the worst in the country to make sure we have captured best practices and avoided major pitfalls. One of our key findings in Miami had little to do with homelessness, but it has a lot to do with San Antonio.

One of the biggest problems the center in Miami had was that their clients were getting arrested for breaking into their monorail system. They weren’t stealing money or harassing the other riders, they just wanted a ride.

“They were getting arrested over 25 cents,” explained a case manager. “The police were upset. ‘You called us over a quarter?’ We were mad about their lack of judgment, but the monorail is just so good and so convenient. It takes them right where they want to go.”

Eventually Miami made the system free and the problem went away. Anybody can hop on the system and get “right where they want to go.”

The end point for the Miami line is directly behind the homeless center, but so is a rail line that is used one day a year. “When the circus comes to town,” I was told. Since the rail line is essentially abandoned, why did the city choose monorail when light rail would have been just as convenient?

“The monorail,” our guide explained, “basically takes you to any tourist area. Miami Beach, South Beach, all the shopping areas, the rail line would just take you to the convention center.”

That is the same problem we face in San Antonio. The light rail proponents point out an abandoned rail line and say, “Let’s start there!” Well, the line was abandoned for a reason.

And say we did start there, then what? Do we start condemning houses and businesses to create new rail lines? Do we “just put them on top of streets”? It sounds easy, but never is.

Not only does light rail always increase car-train accidents (from virtually zero), but it is never “easy” to put the rails on the streets. Inevitably the water, sewer and utilities all have to be relocated and rebuilt. Often the whole street has to be rebuilt, because it wasn’t designed for the weight and vibration of a rail system.

A monorail is much easier (not cheaper – the cost is about the same) to build. It is essentially built 100% off site. The pylons and rails are all prefabricated elsewhere. The contractor drills a hole, drops in the pylon, then lays the rail between the pylons. I was told that the Las Vegas system took 7 months to build.

I asked my friend, Ed, about this. Ed and I lunch during times of crisis when there are world problems that need our input. Ed has a significant finance background, so he is always there to hold my wild ideas up to the light of fiscal reality.

“Monorail is a much better idea,” he said. “They can all be built in existing right-of ways. You stay out of the condemnation business and they drive over cars, not through them.”

That sounded like reason enough for me, but Ed had more. He had seen a number of the newest monorail systems in Europe and they had caught his attention, as well.

“Monorails can run at a profit! Both Seattle and Tokyo run a profit on their systems. We could do the same thing here. We could start with the most profitable lines, then expand to the less profitable, then finally to the loss leaders that would be underwritten by the profitable lines.

“Say we started by with a line from the airport to the downtown area. We know that would be profitable. Then the first expansion would be up 281, with an expansion through downtown to create an additional stop or two.

“The next step would be the shopping arc along 410. Then maybe the employment arc along 410, say BAMC at one end and Lackland at the other.

“Some loops would be very useful. A Medical Center loop from remote parking through all the hospitals could let them rationalize their development plan. Maybe a downtown loop.

“Probably the next expansion should be the I-10/1604 area. Link UTSA and LaCantera and the Medical Center to downtown using I-10 right-of-way. Then you could expand around 410 and expand the arc along 1604.

“That’s just thinking with a napkin, but you could keep the system perpetually profitable. People like riding on them. They are fun. They let you see the city from above. The monorail system itself would become a tourist destination.

“And think what message that would send about San Antonio! We aren’t a city of the past, trying to rebuild our rail lines. We are the high-tech city of the future building a monorail system!”

And while we’re at it, what if our young mayor invited Disney to town to design and manage the installation of our system? What if he got Disney intimately involved with planning our city of the future?